


a pair of pixies

by sapphicish



Category: Harlots (TV)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-08
Updated: 2018-08-08
Packaged: 2019-06-23 23:12:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 913
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15617121
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sapphicish/pseuds/sapphicish
Summary: Isabella nearly loses herself when Charlotte first deepens the kiss.





	a pair of pixies

**Author's Note:**

> 2x06 was really something else huh. it really did That huh.
> 
> this fic? a mess. me? also a mess! so it's fine!

Isabella nearly loses herself when Charlotte first deepens the kiss, nearly cries; fingers cup her cheek, a shoulder, a hip, the back of her neck. It is at once too much and not enough, all of it. She's undressed slowly, encouraged again and again to stay still and allow Charlotte to do all of the work, to allow her to lead her off and away into a bedroom by a hand, to allow her to be the one to unravel the laces and remove the wig and set aside the pearls and the earrings, to allow her to push her down onto the bed in the weak candlelight.

It is not weak enough that it obscures either of them, and it is once a blessing and not a blessing: she can see Charlotte, but in that same way, Charlotte can see _her._

Charlotte is beautiful – so beautiful and so soft and all Isabella really wants to do in the moment, here and now, is lean up and kiss her again because it had been more than she had ever believed was _possible._ All because of a single kiss, her chest had felt near to bursting. It was an odd, mysterious feeling, not an unpleasant one, and she wants it again—but Charlotte takes her time.

Isabella _does_ weep, truly, when she is fully bared at last in front of Charlotte's roaming eyes. She does not expect it, but it comes forth in a great tide of emotion that washes over her as soon as she sees Charlotte seeing _her,_ seeing all of her body, seeing—everything. 

Everything. 

It batters her senses, overwhelms her, and when the first sob comes she's so humiliated that she turns onto her side and pushes Charlotte away, hiding her face in her hands. If she could leave quickly and effortlessly and without a single sound, she would.

But Charlotte does not give her even a moment to piece herself back together. She pulls her in instead, fingers gentle when they stroke against her arms, shoulders, hands, and nowhere else.

“I'm sorry,” Isabella manages, somehow, bites against the flesh of her palm to control herself. It works, but just barely, and when she opens her eyes and sees Charlotte looking at her, silent and soft-eyed, she nearly falls to pieces all over again. She wants to stand and dress and leave, leave far away to a place no one will see her, so that she cannot be laughed at or scolded or _hurt._ Loneliness aches, but it is surely better than all of this. Surely.

“Will you...say something?” 

“I want to show you the things that you deserve,” Charlotte says as though she does not see Isabella's shame at all, fingers laid against her stomach. “That is _all_ I want, Lady Isabella. Will you let me?"

A tightness lurks in the back of her throat when she settles back against the pillows and closes her eyes—and immediately opens them again, of course, because having them shut reminds her of something else, something much worse, something best forgotten in this moment.

And Isabella doubts many things, but this is one that she does not: Charlotte deserves better than that.

“Show me, then,” Isabella says, hears her own voice emerge in a rasp.

Charlotte's responding smile is bright and full of teeth, and Isabella's trepidation is no doubt a very small price to pay for that – and for what comes next, Charlotte seeming to rise and fall at once to her command.

The arrival at her pleasure is abrupt and quick, forceful even when Charlotte is slow and quiet; she does not realize it's there until it _is there,_ making her hips jolt and her hands tighten around Charlotte's shoulders while lips are at her throat and ear and chest, murmuring gentle encouragements and – and it is so unlike _anything_ –

So unlike _everything._

Charlotte does not stop as Isabella thinks she might; her touch, already gentle, already soft, grows only more tender as she goes, her kisses more languid, and the knowledge that Charlotte touches her like this still even after what she has learned this evening is –

Is impossible to think about, or the thoughts in her head grow worse, more jumbled, more painful.

Under Charlotte's attention, they almost uncoil from eachother, like hooks sunk into her skull up until the very moment Charlotte lays her down and kisses her.

Upon the passing of the hour, Isabella grows oversensitive enough to stop it herself; reaches down to pry Charlotte's hand from her hip and thigh, and for a moment imagines it will be difficult, that perhaps Charlotte will not want to stop. But she stops the moment Isabella touches her wrist, and a foreign feeling bubbles up inside of her and emerges in a startled, breathless laugh when Charlotte lifts her head and crawls up to lay next to her, lips grazing her jaw.

“Do you believe me now?” Charlotte whispers against her ear. “You are not damned; and if you are, then so am I.”

Isabella closes her eyes, curls her fingers into the sheets, and when she clears her mind she can almost believe that; can almost believe this brief moment can and will last forever.

Two damned and not-damned women, fingers linked, hearts beating near as one, and all without her own secrets looming over her like a curse.

It is not an unattractive image, not an unattractive feeling.

And all the deadlier for it.

**Author's Note:**

> isabella is absolutely the kind of person to cry during sex. often. don't @ me


End file.
